Boots on the Ground
by Nedy Rahn
Summary: 150,000 years after the fall of the Colonies humanity is making a voyage back. What will the expedition led by Samantha Carter find?


19

**Boots on the Ground**

_By_

_Denise Hemmingway_

Author's Notes:

This is an alternate universe cross-over between the Stargate franchises and the Reimaged Battlestar Galactica. I do not own either franchise or the characters intrinsic to them. I do however own the ones I am using in this story that are not canon characters.

Notes on the size of things:

The galaxy is 100000 light years across

The Orion Spiral Arm Fragment is 10000 ly long and about 3500 ly wide

Earth and our Sun sit 26000 ly from the galactic core.

According to Ronald D. Moore the Colonies are on the rimward edge of our arm.

According to nearly all astronomic data I have looked at we are on the coreward edge of the arm about half-way down the length of it.

Also according to RDM the Colonies are directly across the Orion Arm from us.

We sit as per RDM between the Colonies and the Lagoon Nebula.

The Lagoon Nebula is a real nebula in the Sagittarius Arm which is coreward of the Orion Arm.

For the purposes of this story the Goa'uld Empire is coreward of Earth and we lie just outside its rimward frontier.

Between us and the Colonies are a scattering of habitable worlds some with native sentient species some without. These worlds will be important in later spinoffs for this story.

Rough Timeline for _**Boots on the Ground: (Years in Earth Common Era Years)**_

Unknown Time Humans live an untold number of years with the Lords of Kobol in a utopia on the planet Kobol

-152049 The Thirteenth Tribe of Kobol leaves Kobol to find a new home.

-150049 The Twelve Colonies of Kobol are colonized by the human survivors of Kobol last wars. The Thirteenth Tribe's Cylons rebel against the slavery they're kept in. The planet the Thirteenth Tribe called Earth after the true home of Humanity is destroyed in a nuclear war. Scientists Saul Tigh, Ellen Tigh, Galen Tyrol, Samuel Anders, and Tory Foster redevelop "Resurrection Technology and Cloning". Their home city is nuked and they awaken on a special ship they built. They head out of their star system seeking the other twelve tribes.

-148049 Graystone Industries develop the most successful line of Cylons. The various models were used as laborers, police, security and soldiers.

-148047 The Cylons rebel against their slavery; The Twelve Colonies of Kobol unite under the Articles of Colonization

-148045 the Colonial Battlestar Galactica enters service.

-148035 Lieutenant William "Husker" Adama enters the Colonial Fleet as a Viper Pilot; Adama discovers a secret Cylon lab where they were experimenting on human prisoners; The Final Five discover the Colonies and the Colonial Cylons; The Final Five convince the Colonial Cylons to cease their experiments, make peace with the Colonials, and to leave the Cyrannus Cluster, The Cylon War/ Cylon War of Independence ends.

-147995 The Cylons return after forty years; they've developed new models including biological infiltration ones; The Cylon Fleet using a programmed back door into the Colonial Fleet's Command Navigation Program plant viruses that allow them to take control of Colonial ships; Cylon Basestars take up positions over each of the Twelve Colonies and use nuclear weapons from orbit to destroy all major population centers and military bases; Cylon Centurions are landed on each and precede to exterminate the survivors; a fleet of ships full of survivors escorted by the Colonial Battlestar Galactica escapes the carnage seeking a new home for humanity far from the Cylons; the Colonial Battlestars Pegasus and Valkyrie after disabling their computer networks make blind jumps to escape destruction.

-147994 The Battlestars Pegasus and Valkyrie reunite with the Galactica with another fifteen civilian ships; The survivors of the Twelve Colonies briefly settle on a planet the call New Caprica; the Cylons find the planet and occupy it after driving off the larger civilian ship and the three Battlestars. The Valkyrie is left to protect the remaining civilian fleet as the Galactica and Pegasus affect the rescue of the colonists on New Caprica; they drive of the covering Cylon Basestars and rescue three quarters of the colonists before leaving; the two Battlestars destroy three of four Basestars left by the Cylons as covering squadron.

-147993 The Cylons split in a Civil War over the treatment of the mechanical models by the Ones, Fours, and Fives. The Twos, Sixes, and Eights seek out the Colonials; After nearly escaping death in the atmosphere of a gas giant during refueling operations Kara Thrace goes on a scouting mission to find Earth; The Thrace Expedition finds the remnants of the Rebel Cylons on a single Basestar; the Thrace Expedition and the Rebel Cylons join the main Fleet; Admiral Adama authorizes a strike against the Cylon Resurrection Hub, the Hub is destroyed after the rescue of the Cylon Model Three know as D'Anna Biers; the Fleet finds Earth, but it's still a barren nuclear wasteland, the Fleet leaves to find a habitable world far from the Loyalist Cylons

-147991 The Rebel Cylon Basestar and the Battlestar Valkyrie remain with the Fleet as the Battlestars Pegasus and Galactica jump away with all volunteer crews to strike the mobile space station the Cylons call the Colony to rescue Sharon Agathon's daughter Hera after she's kidnapped by Sharon Valerii, the Colony is destroyed, Hera is rescued and almost all Loyalist Cylons are killed; The Survivors of the Twelve Colonies of Kobol protected by the Battlestars Galactica, Valkyrie and Pegasus plus the Rebel Cylon Basestar Nike find and colonize the real Earth unknowingly naming it Earth in honor of the lost world of the Thirteenth Tribe.

2009 Earth discovers evidence of the Great Exodus from Kobol in the wilds of the Rift Valley in northwestern Tanzania in eastern Africa; an expedition is sent rimward to find the worlds of the Twelve Colonies and seek out more of the truth of the evolution of the Tau'ri. The Lucian Alliance begins to get bolder attacking the more developed worlds of the Protected Planets Treaty and allied worlds of Earth's; The Battlestar Valkyrie is discovered in the northern polar orbit of Venus and towed back to Earth; after the destruction of a Wraith Hive Ship and its associated Cruisers and Dart-class fighters Disclosure is giving to all but the most secret parts of the Stargate Program and to the existence of Earth's Starfleet; here and there across the globe anarchists use Disclosure as an excuse to riot, loot, and burn, but the riots are quelled in short order before society can be majorly disrupted. The IOA only opens membership to those nations that match the People's Republic of China as the bare minimum of civil society and respect for human rights. Many more repressive and reactionary regimes complain in the General Assembly of the United Nations, but many of these find themselves blocked from future membership in even the Security Council as every time a vote comes up to allow one of them membership all of the permanent five block and veto their requests; the Hammond Expedition is sent rimward to find the lost worlds of the Twelve Colonies and the Thirteenth Tribe.

**Chapter 1**

_**An archeological dig in northern Tanzania circa 2009 CE:**_

Doctor Stratis Koliva of the University of Athens in Athens, Greece leads a team from that university and several in the rest of the European Union and the United States of America. They're digging through an ancient settlement that predates most known human ancient communities by 150 millennia. The Koliva expedition is financed by the International Oversight Authority of the United Nations. Koliva is tasked with finding the remains of Alteran settlements on Earth and perhaps recovering their lost technology so that it can be studied.

Dr. Koliva watches his students and colleagues as they work in the dirt. Like the fictitious Dr. Henry "Indiana" Jones Jr. Koliva believes that you can only do Archeology in the field and it is in the dirt where you will find the artifacts that tell you of the unwritten past, and or rebuke or verify ancient stories. He smiled as a small group of students and archeologists get excited in one of the dig pits near what had once been a temple or some sort of communal building.

"Stratis come down here!" an extremely excited Dr. Daniel Jackson was holding what looked like an iron or steel box. A box that had to be a plant, but it looked to be as old as the rest of the dig. The box itself had been removed from a small tomb like chamber near the foundation of the communal building. It seemed to be a time capsule almost. He remembered how excited they were last year when they found the crypt of a woman in her mid-thirties that when tested for DNA was found to be a common ancestor of just about everyone in the expedition. This find instead of providing answers only provided additional questions.

Stratis worked his way down to the American archeologist to look at the box. After climbing down several ladders and stepping down a few terraces he stood next to his friend Daniel, Doctor Daniel Jackson. Daniel had made everyone sign a nondisclosure agreement prior to initiating this dig. Then he briefed everyone on what they were seeking and what the cover story would be to the rest of the world and the scientific community that didn't have the proper clearance. Already Hera Agathon was only being called Mitochondrial Eve. Only the facts that she lived over 100,000 years ago in the southern end of the Rift Valley in northwestern Tanzania and that she was genetically a common ancestor to nearly all living humans were revealed in any detail in various scientific journals and magazines like National Geographic and Smithsonian.

The fact that they had found a hermetically sealed armory with weapons that easily resembled modern firearms and another sealed room with what looked like computers and radios were kept out of the 'Official Reports' to the scientific world. Here in the electronics room they also found a surviving and nearly uncorrupted library of the settlement's history. The settlers weren't the other ancestors of Humanity, the Alterans, but Colonists from a place called the Twelve Colonies of Kobol and some biological cybernetic humanoids that were physically able to interbreed with either native humans or Colonial humans. The trouble was throughout all the surviving information there weren't any references on how to find these lost Twelve Colonies of Kobol. Stratis had sent in his reports to the IOA in Geneva and to the international Homeworld Security Command in Washington copies of all this data discovered.

The biggest surprise was that these Colonials spoke a proto-Greek that was almost mutually intelligible by speakers of Modern Greek. Koliva, Jackson and the rest of the senior members of their expedition were in a state of shock that they could read all the surviving written data on the stonework and on several later period stone and clay tablets. These Colonials had suffered from a degradation of their technology over the generations of their existence here. Koliva reviewed all of this in his mind as he went over to Jackson to see what he and his student assistants had found in the small crypt.

"What have you there Daniel?" Koliva asked as he stepped up next to his friend and IOA Archeologist. He saw Daniel was smiling and he pointed to an engraved caption on the lid of the metal coffer sized box. It read, 'For our future children, the Articles of Colonization and the Scrolls of Pythia, treasure them and take care not to follow our path.' Koliva looked at Jackson, "Should we open it Daniel?"

Daniel shook his head saying, "Not here Stratis, but in a sterile and controlled environment like back at Atlantis or at Area Fifty-One." Stratis nodded in agreement then ordered several of the student assistants to get a packing crate to ready the coffer for shipment to Atlantis. As soon as the metal box was in the small grate Stratis attached a transporter beacon on it. Then Daniel radioed the USS Odyssey which beamed up the box. Already most of the anomalous artifacts had been moved to Atlantis in the same way where Drs. McKay and Zelenka were studying them. So far a rough history of the Twelve Colonies had been assembled. It seems that in deep ancient times the Alterans settled some humans from Earth on a distant world named Kobol where they established a reserve or preserve for humanity. They it seemed according to records found in the Alteran data base on Atlantis had established this settlement to ensure a free population of native humans which the Alterans had up-lifted to be essentially modern humans.

On this planet Kobol the humans and Alterans lived for thousands of years even beyond the time of the Great Plague that killed off all but the population of Atlantis which left Earth for the Pegasus Galaxy over 1,000,000 years ago. It seemed that the Alterans lost contact with the colony of Kobol when they evacuated to the Pegasus Galaxy and weren't able to seek out what happened to them when they returned to Earth over 10,000 years ago. Now Koliva's expedition had discovered evidence that the Kobolians had found Earth on their own and named the planet accidentally the same name it already held. Koliva had smirked and quietly laughed at that the last time he was in the library of Atlantis looking up data on the Kobolian line of humans and the term Cylon.

The limited information the Alterans had on Kobol and its colonys never mentioned what Cylons were. It was only from studying the information from the archival chamber of the settlement's communal building that he and Jackson learned of the Cylons. They weren't like the Replicators, but they were at first robotic creations of humanity similar to the primitive robots currently being made. The biggest differences were that Earth's robots weren't artificially intelligent yet. "Jackson let's beam back to Atlantis before McKay gets his sticky figures on the contents of that box. I want to read these Articles of Colonization and Scrolls of Pythia, how about you?"

"Stratis you know I do," answered Jackson with an overwhelming desire visible in his eyes. Then Jackson called upon the Odyssey to beam them up and send them to Atlantis. In Atlantis' Conference room after Stratis and Jackson studied the Articles and the Scrolls along with other data they went to Generals Landry and O'Neill and Director Woolsey to get authorization to plan a mission to Kobol and its thirteen colonies. Jackson looked at everyone present including President Henry Hayes saying, "After Doctor Koliva and I reviewed what we've found so far and compared it with information from both the Asgard Core and the Alteran Data Base we decided that an expedition needs to be launched to find these worlds that were once home to some of our ancestors. These worlds lie rimward of us and by now more than one hundred fifty thousand years since their abandonment they should be habitable again. We could after building the necessary ships colonize them and perhaps even find stargates from dead worlds and establish a new gate network from Earth to them."

_**Atlantis' East Pier Ship Yards six months later:**_

Colonel Samantha Carter sat in the Command Chair of the USS George S. Hammond the latest of Earth's Deep Space Carriers. The Hammond had been built in six months due to use of Asgard construction beams and Alteran industrial systems. The ship was twenty-five meters longer and five meters wider than the rest of the DSCs and the first of the D model of the DSC-304. Carter knew her ship carried the same armament as her sister ships, but her sensors were better and instead of a traditional back lit Lexan plotting board behind her in the rear of the Bridge there was an holographic tactical plot table. There was also at her station a heads up holographic tactical display so she can monitor the tactical situation without leaving her chair.

The Hammond's shake down was originally to take in several relays the teams that would establish a base on the desert world Icarus, but after the findings of the Koliva Expedition to Tanzania the governments of the permanent members of the UN Security Council and its IOA board ordered instead an expedition to find the Twelve Colonies, this other Earth and Kobol. Col. Carter's orders were to take an expedition led by Doctors Daniel Jackson, Stratis Koliva, and Nicholas Rush to these worlds so that they could survey and find any artifacts revealing more of the story of these lost colonies. Well that was before the discovery in Venus' orbit of a large very ancient starship. It had two external flight pods and a whale like central hull with a head shaped like that of an alligator.

The ship was towed into Earth orbit five months ago by the Odyssey. Now in orbit over Atlantis the ancient Colonial Battlestar Valkyrie was being repaired and refitted. The Daedalus and now repaired Apollo were searching the rest of the Solar System for any other ships of the lost Survivor Fleet. From the reports to her, Sam knew that the Cylon Basestar had been given over to the surviving Centurions to seek out their own world. After reading this she wondered if Arlen's world was the home the robotic Cylons discovered and then developed a means of building near human like androids rather than new biological Cylon models. In her diary she made a note to return to that planet someday and ask. Though she wasn't very religious when she began her tenure with Stargate Command the wars with the Goa'uld, the Wraith, and the Ori made her reevaluate her belief system and after talking with some rather notable scientists she knew that were also believers in their own right and faith Sam began to study and develop her own belief in the Creator.

Sam was meditating on just this when Daniel and Stratis came on to the Bridge followed by Colonels Mitchell, Sheppard, Telford, and Young. Not long after came in Dr. Rush and Second Lieutenant Elli Wallace. They all patiently stood behind and to the right of Sam in her chair. She finished her meditations and turned her chair so she could face her staff. Two of the Colonels were actually senior to her and the other two were recently promoted to the pay grade O-6. Army 2LT Wallace was acting as Dr. Rush's assistant and when on planets during the duration of this expedition he would be Rush's guard and protector. Wallace came out of one of the Army's Space Battalions. He had besides his technological training from MIT where he got a Doctorate in Cybernetics and Computers he was also a successful graduate of the Army's Ranger School and Special Warfare Center. Sam thought this made him the perfect protector for the rather acerbic Rush. Wallace's IQ was actually even higher than hers or even Rush's, but he had a personality that allowed him to befriend people rapidly. Besides, Sam rather liked the young Army officer; who kind of reminded her of her Senior Science Officer Major Jennifer Hailey and her Assistant Science Officer and Linguist Captain Sharon Satterfield.

Sam saw the senior members of her expedition standing there before her. Cameron Mitchell commanded SG-1 made up of himself, Daniel Jackson, Teal'c and Vala Mal Doran. John Sheppard led SGA-1 redesignated SG-25 composed of himself, Teyla Emmagen, Ronon Dex, and Dr. Rodney McKay. David Telford commanded Sam's Marine Detachment, and Everett Young commanded her Air Wing. Sam herself commanded the Hammond and the Second Space Group consisting of the Hammond and the Apollo and their Air Wings and Marine Detachments. The Apollo and the Hammond were slated to leave out system in one hour and Colonel Abraham Ellis was present for this briefing via the Holographic Communications Display. So he wasn't actually standing on her bridge, but his.

"Gentlemen are you ready," Sam began as she started the briefing. Over the next hour they discussed the parameters of the mission, what forces they had between the Hammond and the Apollo, and their goals and objectives. Then in turn both Dr. Jackson and Dr. Koliva briefed everyone on their findings. Next Rush went over what to do with any technology discovered working or not. Her two contact team commanders stated that they understood what they were to do on planet when they found each of the worlds including New Caprica.

Elli listened to all of this then finally raised his hand to ask a question, "Ma'am what if on either New Caprica or any of the worlds of the Cyrannus system we find other descendants of Colonial survivors, the biological Cylons or the hybrids of both?" He looked at her with wonder on his face and worry too. "I mean after DNA test have been run on many of us including me we've found most modern humans especially many associated with the SGC and HWSC to be a blend of native human stock, Alteran stock, Kobolian stock and biological Cylon stock. I mean we're all a race of hybrids. What do we tell our cousins if we find them out there?"

It was Dr. Jackson that answered, "Elli we'll study them, find out if it's worth revealing to them that we are descendants of the other survivors of the Cylon Wars and we'll let them know if it is. I honestly think we'll have to find living cousins first. After we down loaded the navigational charts from the Valkyrie and adjusted them for stellar drift we think we have a good idea where to find the Thirteenth's Earth and New Caprica. I don't know if we'll find any human colonies on either world, but we'll see."

Rodney spoke up then, "If the data from one hundred fifty thousand or more years ago is still accurate I doubt that we'll find anyone on the Thirteenth's world, but we might find people inhabiting New Caprica and even maybe once we find them some of the Twelve Colonies. I doubt we'll find much in the way of above ground ruins after so long, but we could find some below ground on each planet that could give more insight as to the fate of our kindred out there." Drs. Koliva and Jackson nodded in agreement with Dr. McKay. Dr. Rush kind of just scowled, but eventually agreed that was highly unlikely that the Thirteenth's Earth would yield much in the way of recoverable artifacts so long after the death of its civilization. On the other hand he believed as McKay did that the Colonies or New Caprica would be the best place to find modern descendants of the Colonials and any left behind biological Cylons amongst them.

"To be realistic, it's quite an endeavor to evacuate several thousand people from a planetary surface and back then Admirals Adama and Cain must of made the command decision to rescue who they could and get them out as best they can," Col. Sheppard said as he looked at the holographic sphere of space showing Earth and its Solar System in the center and the possible locations of the Thirteenth's Earth, New Caprica, Kobol and the Twelve Colonies all almost in a straight line rimward from them. "I suspect that we could colonize by now Old Earth and if New Caprica, Kobol, or any of the Twelve Colonies don't have native populations we could do the same there. After all it's been over one hundred fifty thousand years; the radiation has fallen to safe background levels by now."

Rush spoke up saying, "Be that as it may, we still have to find these worlds before we can survey them to see if they are worthy of colonization or not, but if we do we're the rightful heirs to them as it was their people that helped to make us." He then leaned in to study the locations that had been recorded from the navigation data base of the Valkyrie and then had the various plots adjusted for stellar drift. He saw that the modern positions were most likely to be accurate because their ancestors among the Colonials and Cylons were as meticulous as the Alterans and Asgard in keeping records and documenting their travels. The records still stored in the heavily radiation shielded hull of the Valkyrie were invaluable to planning this expedition. Rush smiled as he believed that mankind was on the brink of a new Age of Discovery. He kind of felt like a modern day Columbus, Magellan, Drake, Hudson, et al all rolled into one. "Face it folks we're on the brink of being the modern exploration heroes of Earth. We're walking in the footsteps of Columbus and many others."

Elli then increased the magnification to show just the Twelve Colonies in the Cyrannus Cluster. It showed the position of four main sequence stars. Three of them were like Sol and the other was cooler and more like Alpha Centauri Beta the yellow-orange companion to Alpha Centauri Alpha. "Do you suppose that after all this time we'll find any remains of the rest of the Colonial Fleet? I mean think of what we could learn just from studying any wrecks still floating in the Helios System." He zoomed in again zeroing in on the Helios Alpha System. "Once we get to Helios Alpha I think we ought to begin the survey with Caprica. According to the data recovered from the Valkyrie's data base Caprica was an Earth like world. It could prove to be the best place to start if it has recovered fully from the Second Cylon War's nuclear bombardment. From the records that I've read it was documented that the Cylons used mostly neutron like weapons there unlike the dirtier normal thermal nuclear weapons they used on Picon and Scorpia."

Carter studied the 3D holographic maps of the Helios Alpha system and its sisters. Then she made her decision, "Here's what we'll do. The Second Space Group will travel first to Old Earth, then to New Caprica. After doing surveys there we'll bypass Kobol leaving it for last. I'm still concerned with it being an Alteran colony originally that whatever booby-traps that may have been left behind could make the warning about a price paid in blood to be as valid today as back then. The Alterans made their things to last and last a very long time. Atlantis is a perfect example of that."

Sam focused in the HTDT in on the whole of the Helios System first, "We'll do a hyper jump from New Caprica to the gas giant Ragnar first. We'll see if the old space station is still there and check to see if it is usable. Everett, David, and Dr. Rush your part of the expedition will set up a base there to be used by the Second as a forward operating base. Then I'll dispatch the jumpers the Apollo and Hammond are carrying to do orbital surveys of all the planets of the Helios system. I want the Apollo afterward to seek out dead worlds with stargates and bring one to Ragnar. If the station is still there and usable; I want to set up a gate room within. We'll plan on finding an alternate base on one of the former Twelve Colonies if Ragnar Anchorage is beyond repair and best left abandoned. In that case we'll set up a stargate at that base. Ellis when you take the stargate; I want you to take its DHD too."

"Now we won't set up a base on Old Earth, we'll just do some preliminary surveys and leave a navigational beacon as a marker claiming it for our Earth. We'll do the same thing with New Caprica whether there is a surviving population or not. I suspect that by now its ice age is long past and from what we can see here its star system has drifted away from the nebula it was found in. I think that it was the nebula that initiated the ice age that the Colonials found New Caprica to be in at the time. The dust of the nebula must of filtered out most of the heat and light from New Caprica's sun causing it to be as cold as our northern most regions during modern winters." As she spoke of these Sam scrolled the holographic map to each world and zoomed in to show greater detail.

Prior to getting the Hammond and the Apollo ready for this mission the SGC sent out automated space probes to these system Sam designed using the Asgard Core and the Alteran Data Base. She used Asgard construction beams to build each one. She called the small semi-artificially intelligent craft Raptors in honor of the small multipurpose shuttlecraft recovered from the Valkyrie. The data shown for each system on the modern holographic map was as current as last week. Each probe was the size of an F302. They all had a hyperdrive, an Asgard reactionless maneuver drive, Asgard shielding, Asgard sensors, and a subspace communications array besides their AI core. The ships weren't sentient, but were more like a very well trained search or scout dog. In function though they were essentially modern Cylon Raiders only dedicated to reconnaissance missions only. Unlike their ancient Cylon Raider counterparts though, these modern Raptors were more like the atmospheric Global Hawks used by the Air Force and CIA for surveillance of targets on Earth.

Sam unlike the Alterans and Colonials before her hard wrote firmware into the Raptors that followed Asimov's laws of robotics. First among these laws was that a robot could not through commission or omission cause the death or injury of a human being unless it was to save the life or lives of other human beings. Sam had in a brief sent to the IOA before the mission outlined a protocol for the creation of Earth's robots to have all of them installed with firmware enforcing Asimov's laws. If Earth ever got around to taking the science of robotics to the level that the Colonies had by creating a new race of Cylons these Cylons would not become like the T-800s and other Terminators of the very successful movie franchise featuring the former governor of California. In fact at Area 51 and other US military robotics laboratories Asimov's laws were instituted six months ago. If the US made its own Cylons they wouldn't be able to do as their earlier cousins instigate a war against humanity, or so Sam hoped. She hoped that humanity would finally learn from the disastrous mistakes of the Alterans with their Replicators and the Colonials with their Cylons and not make dangerous synthetic creatures that could turn on them and destroy their civilization.

_**Six weeks later in orbit over Old Earth:**_

The USS Hammond orbited over the northern hemisphere of the planet the Thirteenth Tribe of Kobol had settled and later met its end on. The world did indeed resemble the true Earth. There even were constellations similar in appearance to those seen in Earth's nighttime skies. These were similar, but not the same. Sam smiled as she looked at a holographic rendering of Cylon Earth's night sky as seen from the surface of a continent that had similarities to North America.

"Yes these skies are similar, but I can tell the differences once I overlay our constellations over these. The Greco-Roman Zodiac ones have the closets analogs, but the rest don't match nearly as well," she said to Maj. Hailey, Dr. McKay, and Dr. Rush as she looked over them in comparison to what was seen in Earth's night skies. "I think it was our Earth the Thirteenth Tribe was seeking so long ago when it left Kobol to find a new home. My guess and Daniels is that the fact that Earth was the origin of humanity was lost to those living on Kobol over time. When the Thirteenth left Kobol to seek a home separate from their brothers back on that planet they must have read about Earth and sought to return there. Instead they found this planet." Sam turned the imagery to show the surface again and made several notations marking the evidence of ancient cities to be explored later by more permanent expeditions and suitable sites for colonization. The only relic they had found to be of any real use was an ancient Alteran base where they found the last of the biological Cylon Model Threes in stasis in an Alteran chamber. The outpost was powered by several working ZPMs and D'Anna Biers hadn't aged a day since she entered the chamber all those years ago after finding the hidden base.

From her tenure as the Commander of the Atlantis Expedition Col. Carter knew that the Alteran Stasis Pods could keep a human organically born or synthetically created alive almost indefinitely. Though the official report on the Alteran found in Antarctica said she had been frozen in the ice cap that wasn't exactly true. The woman had been in a medical stasis pod in a facility that was still functioning even after she was placed in it over a million years ago. So finding D'Anna Biers preserved and still living in a similar pod on the Thirteenth's Earth didn't surprise Sam in the least. The good thing was that Ms. Biers wasn't carrying an example of the Ori engineered plague that nearly wiped out the Alteran branch of Humanity.

Three days after finding D'Anna, Sam visited her in the Hammond's Infirmary. "How are you doing today, D'Anna?" Sam asked as she walked into the semiprivate room that was part of the Infirmary's hospital ward. She saw that D'Anna was using the ship's data base to study English, but Sam used a translator device developed using the Hammond's copy of the Asgard Core and associated Asgard Construction Beams. Sam didn't want D'Anna to suffer through her nearly native like fluent Modern Greek when the Asgard device would make it easier to be understood. When Sam spoke English D'Anna would here Caprican and the reverse was true for Sam.

D'Anna was still going through therapy to relearn how to walk, but she could speak just fine. She looked up toward the blond human who to her sensed like she could trace part of her linage to a Model Six walk in and ask her how she was doing. D'Anna replied, "Better than I thought I would be when I stepped into that stasis pod you found me in Colonel Carter. Unfortunately I seem to be the last of my race though now days I'm not complaining. Back then I was depressed to find Earth, this Earth a nuclear radioactive waste land. I didn't go back into space with my parents and my siblings because I thought my world had ended with this discovery."

"How long did it take you to find the Alteran base on this Earth?" Sam asked as she held a digital recorder in her hand as she continued her debriefing of the last known humanoid Cylon. Granted D'Anna said that the New Zealander actress Lucy Lawless resembled her some as well as several other Earth actors and actresses resembled the models of the humanoid Cylons. It was when she called Sharon Satterfield, Eight that Carter realized that it was possible that the genotypes of these ancient human form Cylons may have been passed down through the genes of those that made it to Earth and interbred either with Colonial humans or Earth's own native humans. As she thought of these things Sam listened to D'Anna tell her full tale again and she ended it with her last actions before Col. Sheppard's team found her and awoke her from the stasis pod.

"The base I found after I was beginning to run low on food. Admiral Adama left me with several weeks' supply of Colonial Field Rations and some Algae protein ration bars," D'Anna said giving a sour face at the mention of the Algae bars. But she continued, "I found a hidden hatch in the side of a cave up on a mountain near the ruined city my parents had once called home. In the hidden bunker I found a radiation free shelter and even an archive that told me about this world having been one of the colonies of a great galactic empire built by the true ancestors of man, the Alterans. In the holographic interface room I learned that it was the Alterans who were the Lords of Kobol specifically the Houses of Zeus, Odin, and Ra with Zeus' house or the Olympians being the rulers." D'Anna took a sip of water from a liter sized covered thermal cup.

"I found their medical bay and what I thought were some sort beds. Only when I stepped in the device's sensors must have detected my radiation damage and it put me into the pod locking me in first with some sort of force field just like in a Colonial Science Fiction video. Then it covered me with that dense almost ice like covering Colonel Sheppard found me in. I guess some sort of medical nanite technology went to work on me repairing the radiation damage, because your doctor didn't find any damage when he tested me earlier," D'Anna added answering Sam's question finally.

Sam smiled then a warm smile at D'Anna and said, "I guess one hundred fifty thousand years is enough imprisonment for your part in the Cylon Genocide D'Anna. None of the Colonials have lived, but many of us on this ship have Colonial, Alteran, Cylon, and native Earth human DNA in our genome. That includes me though I have the added genetic markers from the Tok'ra that died within me trying to save my life from a Goa'uld assassin over ten years ago." Sam shut off the digital recorder then and said, "D'Anna you can join us. Your past is just that the past. You've managed to go to sleep long ago and awoken to a brave new world. We don't have a clue where the freed Rebel Centurions went with their Basestar, but you brother Two and his copies along with your sisters Six and Eight and their copies live on in the blood of many modern Earth Humans. The Kobolian humans interbred with your Cylon siblings and the native humans to create the modern human race. We aren't as physically strong as you, though there are a few individuals. I am likely one of the many on this ship that can match you intellectually, but many of our modern brethren are likely no more intelligent than the average Colonial of your time. The Cylon-Human Wars are over D'Anna as far as we know. None of the surviving loyalist Cylons sought out Earth as far as we can tell unless it was long after the Survivor Fleet reached Earth and they had sent their ships into our sun. I mean there has to be a reason why Lucy Lawless for example resembles you or Dean Stockwell resembles John Cavil. Yes we know the names or at least the Model Numbers used by your brothers and sisters." Sam smiled then and offered D'Anna a caring hug to welcome her into the modern age.

"Colonel Carter, what do I do now?" D'Anna said looking both lost and confused. She had outlived all her contemporaries and Col. Carter didn't seem the least bit concerned or surprised by her method of survival.

"D'Anna I understand that your model was good at administration. Also I know from ancient records all Cylons were quick studies or learners. Since you look and are in essence human despite some nano-cybernetic enhancements, denser musculature, and bone structure. D'Anna you can return with us to Earth and join the general population or you can join us at Atlantis and help with protecting Earth and several other worlds we're responsible for," Sam said.

D'Anna now looked thoughtful and without any perception of deceit she said, "I guess I can start over and by working with you and your people make amends for my part in the destruction of the Twelve Colonies of Kobol. You know it was the first of the Cavils that goaded us into returning to the Colonies and destroying them, killing perhaps fifty billion. That is a sin I deeply will need to repent and make amends for. Only those that survived those times are now with their gods and I have only you our and their descendants to work with toward my atonement. I hope that you and your superiors will let me do this. I don't want to go to god with this guilt without attempting to cleanse my soul."

"D'Anna I wasn't a very religious person, before our war with the Ori, but I understand. I've done things I'm not all that proud of as well. I don't know about you, but I blew up a sun once just to kill one of our enemies before he and his fleet could destroy one of our allies. D'Anna I'm sure that you'll do fine and if you ever need a person to confide in I'm here. This ship isn't as big as a Battlestar or a Basestar, but I'm easy to find. Just call if you want to get a load off. I only ask that if I'm busy with running the Hammond or engaged with an emergency you be patient. I'll get with you when I'm free, don't worry," Sam said taking D'Anna's right hand in hers and giving it a sisterly clasp. "Remember I'm here for you D'Anna. You don't need to be alone ever again."


End file.
